Dating: Los Angeles Vs. Manhattan

People have always said there's lots of fish in the sea. I've been living in Los Angeles for over three years now and have dated only two people, one was a long distance relationship from high school, while the other was the guy that got me to break up with my long distance boyfriend. There have been only a few even prospective men since then. Where are all the fish?

In the week I spent in New York visiting a friend, I managed to go to over 20 bars and clubs, get hit on dozens of times, and find a really cute, smart, rich investment banker to hang out with. And by hang out I mean hook up.

The night life/dating scene in Manhattan is like this: pre-game, pay a twenty dollar cover in Union Square, walk into a bar, realize the bar sucks, and take a five minute subway to another bar in So Ho. Pass a bunch of hipsters on your way into the lounge, and get hit on by the guy standing in your path to the bar. Two almost hot guys buy you drinks, these same guys ask you where your from. When you say California and they get really excited you think they have a fetish with California girls. When your friend says she's from Texas and they say they love cowgirls you realize they have a "whatever gets me in your pants" fetish. You go back to Union Square to another bar. You thought you wouldn't get in because there is always a bouncer with a special list and exotic European girls entering a secret passageway, leading through a kitchen into an iron gated dungeon themed bar, but tonight you get in. Your friend's friend is in there with another friend, you and your friend leave the bar with your friend's friend and his friend. You hang out with them for the next three nights. You drink a $1200 bottle of Dom Perignon on a rooftop and laugh at him yell provoking words at the other street wanderers below. You think he expects sex, when it turns out he is totally fine with just making out and cuddling, you almost fall in love. But it's New York, your friend's roommate is having sex with him too.

The night life/dating scene in LA is like this: living on the westside, its a half hour drive to any decent clubs. No one wants to be the DD, so you all just get wasted at your apartment and walk to the bar down the street; it's Monday night so there's karaoke and that blues band that always plays is jaming. There's frat boys in the back of the bar and creepy forty-five year olds that won't stop starring in the front. A little uncomfortable and bored and not drunk enough, you end up congregating in the middle of the bar with the rest of your anti-social friends. It's 1am already and the bar is closing. It will take too long to drive somewhere else and everyone's drunk already. The night was a huge bust. On the walk home, you all talk about some club you heard about in Hollywood that everyone HAS to go to. But it's LA, you all pretend you had a blast and secretly know you'll do the same lame thing tomorrow night.

New York was exciting and LA seems to suck, but I could only live that New York style night life for a short time. The thing is where are all the cute, funny, awesome guys that want commitment? I have yet to find one.

People say there's lots of fish in the sea, but I think maybe they are all on vacation in some other great city right now.

Plan A and Plan B

One of life's mysteries is the challenge to pursue passions and find a fulfilling vocation. These days, I would take pretty much any job as long as it wasn't miserable and did not involve food. I've been lucky enough to avoid the greasy burgers and the quadruple, grande, nonfat, lattes, with whip cream and chocolate sauce on top, although in the past, I've been desperate enough to take a job at American Eagle. It was a glamorous job; I pretended to fold the same pair of jeans over and over again for eight hours. My boss didn't pay us for meetings and took down the counter on the door so our sales quota looked better. The perks--all employees got free movie tickets once and Cinnabon was next door...Nice. There are few jobs I have had so far that I consider worthwhile; most of them are just summer jobs.

I have always had a life plan. When I was younger, I wanted to be a professional soccer player, a teacher, and an artist. In pre-school, I was voted most likely to be the first female president. Once I was in junior high, I decided I wanted to be an archaeologist. Then I read a travel book on the pyramids and Egypt and realized that everything noteworthy had already been discovered. When I was finishing high school, I decided that because painting wasn't a real job--at least I didn't think so at the time--I would go to film school and become a documentary filmmaker. Film did interest me and undoubtedly, I would be content if I attained enough influence and esteem to make a difference with documentaries. However, it was my plan B, my safety. I have since then discovered that my plan B is one of the most difficult fields to succeed in. What happened to plan A and why did I never even consider pursuing it?

Honestly, I want to be a painter. I don't know for sure what I want to paint, with what medium or with what message. All I know for certain is that painting is the only thing in this entire world with which I cannot find a single flaw. Or maybe it is just that the flaws do not trump the joy that it brings me. I know I will always be a painter, but I want to make my living creating and painting.

My favorite quote: "You must get your living by loving" -Henry David Thoreau, A life Without Principle. And yet, I fail to live by this mantra. In asking myself what is holding me back from realizing my dream, my potential, and my fulfilling career answers come easily. It is the fear that my parents will be angry for paying for a wasted education (wasted in their eyes). It is the fear that I won't be good enough. Can I get into grad school? Do I have enough perseverance to try for the next twenty years even without any possible success? Can I really make enough money to make rent?

I ask myself these questions and contemplate my fears constantly, all the while, fooling myself that I still might find a position I enjoy in the film world. I do not regret going to film school. I have learned invaluable lessons about color, framing, composition, technology, story, character development, and photography, which all apply to painting. However, I cannot help but wonder what my life would be like if I had gone to art school.

I am currently making more money painting and getting more work in painting then I am in film. It scares me because I am not putting as much effort into film making as I should. Instead of one-hundred percent, I'm giving eighty-five.

Time will tell. In the next three years, as I graduate and move into the working world, my life will drastically change. The different paths that could be taken are not even fully apparent yet. For now, I have resolved not to make a senior film this year. Rather, I am going to be focusing on a mentorship and trying to find a position in film that uses my painting skills. Ideally, I could meld my two worlds of film and painting, combine my plan A and plan B.

I have always been a planner, but for the first time in my life I have no plan. Until I graduate, I am trying to take one step at a time. When my family pretends I am already Steven Spielberg or acquaintances ask me what I want to be when I grow up, I simply tell them, "I have no clue what I want to do with my life". I'm tired of constricting and cornering myself into an unchanging, inflexible box. I shouldn't have to decide on one thing and give it a name.

When I was little I wanted to be many things. I still want to be and do many things in my life. Currently, I am satisfied with being a student, a painter, a fire dancer, and a documentary filmmaker. Hopefully in the future, I will figure out how to make my living by loving.

Today's Thoughts

I decided that at twenty-one years of age, I am not yet as educated or articulate as I assumed I would be at this point in my life. I have always considered myself a rather intelligent person. If not intelligent, at least fully capable of being rationally well-informed, sarcastic, and perceptive. And yet, I fear my aplomb has made me too cocky to put forth the effort to learn.

While visiting my best friend in Manhattan this past week, there were two instances in which my ignorance and inability to contribute anything to the conversation left me wondering when I stopped learning and why I had not read an entire book for pleasure in years.

The first occurrence was in the midst of my perfect hook-up with Mr. Right Now. It had been an unquestionably ideal night. I immediately fell in love with the roommate of the guy my best friend was dating; he was a dark haired, tan, "halfy". He's Mexican half gave him smooth skin and a hairless body. To top off his pleasing physique, he was an investment banker. At twenty-five he was already making more money than my mother currently makes and more money than I will probably ever produce working in film. Investment banking--a subject I knew nothing about. If I were to define it, I would say describe it as a job where people invest money--really specific right?

We were cuddled together on the most comfortable bed from the W Hotel. The window blinds were half open and I had been starring outside at air vents on the rooftop of the building next door, which had not been visible until daylight broke. Mr. Right Now proclaimed his job to me when I asked what exactly he did. "FX Portfolio and Risk Strategy", he declared, "Pick a business you know a lot about". I knew my educated self had failed me when he began explaining investment banking in terms of Paramount Pictures and Australian movie-making. how must I project myself for him to assume right off the bat that I knew nothing of investment banking? To add insult to injury, I still did not understand what his job was even after his analogy to the film world--maybe he didn't understand the film business? Lying in the investment banker's arms I concluded, I will read a book on this. How is it that I know nothing about investment banking; it seems like such a commonplace job. Surprisingly enough, when I asked my co-workers what investment banking was, their reply--"Investment banking? I'm looking up marajauna".

The other instance in which my incompetance prevailed was with the other guy my best freind was dating. He was 29, in midst of a mid-life crisis, dating a girl barely old enough to drink. With such a reputable occupation--the chief of staff of the senator of New Jersey to be specific, I must suppose that he was of above average intelligence. Of course, his age explained his intelligence as well. Still, I like to think that it is not only possible, but reasonable to think that I could possibly posses the same degree of knowledge as he. And yet, in a conversation involving taxes, elections, and state policies, I was stumped.

I must admit, politics, science, math, and wars are not my subjects of interest. I much prefer the arts, film, painting, photography, English, and history. However, I believe it important to be well-rounded and be able to carry on a conversation with someone--even if they are an expert in the area. Even my best friend could contribute to the politician's insights; whether this was because she herself made a point to investigate the subjects or because she learned about his world through dating him, she knew a great deal more about something than I did. I say this not because I am jealous of her brain power, but because as my longest friend and fellow twenty-one year old, I measure my own competency by her competency. As I continue living this twenty-first year of my life, I commit to continued learning in this next decade. It has been too long since I have read a whole book. Since these embarrassing incidents, I have already read The Unbearable Lightness of Being and begun to read Love in The Time of Cholera and a book on Klimt.

In making a probably false promise to myself--I hope to write on this blog everyday. Perhaps the continual act of writing, looking up words and grammar, and reading will improve my learnedness and ease my disappointment with my current state of mind.